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As flu season approaches, many New Jersey parents are furious over a first-in-the-nation requirement that children get a flu shot in order to attend preschools and day-care centers. The decision should be the parents’, not the state’s, they contend.
Hundreds of parents and other activists rallied outside the New Jersey Statehouse on Thursday, decrying the policy and voicing support for a bill that would allow parents to opt out of mandatory vaccinations for their children. “This is not an anti-vaccine rally – it’s a freedom of choice rally,” said one of the organizers, Louise Habakus. “This one-size-fits-all approach is really very anti-American.”
New Jersey’s policy was approved last December by the state’s Public Health Council and is taking effect this fall. Children from 6 months to 5 years old who attend a child-care center or preschool have until Dec. 31 to receive the flu vaccine, along with a pneumococcal vaccine.
Among the speakers was Robin Stavola of Colts Neck, N.J., who said her daughter, Holly, died in 2000 at age 5 less than two weeks after receiving eight different vaccines, including a booster shot.
“I am not against vaccines, but I do believe there are too many,” she told the crowd.
I’ve only had a flu shot twice in my lifetime. Once in boot camp, and I immediately got the flu, the other time (Fall 2000) a week later I contracted Dengue fever (damn near killed me). Were they connected? Who knows, but I have not had a flu shot since…or the flu. I’ll take a pass.
Yes. Flu and complications kill thousands every year. While the sick, elderly, and very young are most vulnerable, it is usually passed around by those who can withstand the ravages more easily. While you may call it “Nanny State”, flu shots do work.
I also never get flu shots anymore. When I did, I always got sick.
Here is my theory why. In a regular flu shot you are being vaccinated against three strains of flu which were rampant last year. So when you get the shot your immune system works overtime to combat those three strains and is taxed to the limit for a couple of weeks. After all, you only have so many white blood cells to go around, and when they are fully employed, what’s left?
During that time, while your immune system is already on overload, you come into contact with a new flu strain which attacks you and has it’s way with you.
Now if you had not taken the flu shots, your immune system would be more than up to the task to take on the new strain, thereby giving you a couple of days of sniffles but nothing more.
BTW, as far as flu shots go, it should be up to the parents.
Flu shots only work if, months earlier, they guess correctly which flu will be prevalent.
It’s hit or miss at best. And they aren’t broad spectrum.
F- Mandatory shots.
#3, Exactly. If they make a hit, then it’s a home run.
If they miss, you strike out.
In my experience, it’s mostly miss because mutations occur frequently. Just last flu season my area had an epidemic because a new strain mutated in an old folks home and spread throughout the area within months. Guess who suffered more? Those who took flu shots.
I don’t get the flu, neither does my mother. I see little kids in daycare all the time with their snots running down their faces, picking their noses, touching other children on their faces, etc. It’s NATURAL, it’s nature’s way to build up the immune system. Children put everything in their mouths for a reason, it’s natures way of building up the immune system through the tonsils. Vaccinated children do not have as strong immune systems as children who were exposed to the natural disease. Yes it’s true, more die without vaccines but isn’t that the purpose of nature, to thin the herds and only the strong survive?
Perhaps some education is in order for the woefully ignorant like Paddy.
http://www.cdc.gov/FLU/about/qa/flushot.htm
Ah_Yeah I didn’t want to include you with Paddy but you are incorrect.
So, science, medicine, should all be governed by the subjective experience of a small numbers of individuals who think they’ve had a particular kind of experience.
With no proof whatsoever other than what they guess happened to them.
Have you ever lived in a nation where little or no vaccination is available? Gone to school with children crippled by polio or waited for spring to see which kids in the neighborhood died over the winter from diphtheria, scarlet fever, whooping cough?
I did. It was called the United States of America. Several decades back.
Maybe, if you’re lucky, your own kids will have a chance to grow up in such a free land.
#7 “Perhaps some education is in order for the woefully ignorant like Paddy.”
Nothing in that page contradicts what I posted.
Nice try.
I have had 2 or 3. Never got sick afterwords. Next one is coming next week!
#8. moss- All I can do is base it on my own experience. Even the doctor (who my wife worked for) concluded that it was likely the shot lowered my resistance, and allowed the Dengue infection. It was monsoon and therefore mosquito season in the Caribbean at the time, which coincided with flu season. He’s the doctor, his conclusion, not necessarily mine. Occams?
But hey, enjoy your flu shot, I would never tell you you don’t have the right to it. It’s a free country right?
Just 5 years ago we would never have heard of a “freedom of choice rally” in New Jersey.
This is amazing.
# 9 Paddy-O
Oh contraire! Look at your post #3
Here is the part that proves you are ignorant of that which you speak.
With the flu shot, when the “match” between vaccine and circulating strains is close, the vaccine prevents influenza in about 70%-90% of healthy persons younger than age 65 years.
It isn’t hit or miss at all. They only need to be close. Not to mention it usually carries 3 or more strains and they are usually close.
#13 JJ said, “when the “match” between vaccine and circulating strains is close, the vaccine prevents influenza in about 70%-90% of healthy persons younger than age 65 years.”
Here’s the part that proves you can’t read:
“when the “match” between vaccine and circulating strains is close, the vaccine prevents influenza in about 70%-90%”
What that means is that when/if it is close, of those that receive the shot 70-90% are protected.
My doctor tracks this and the 1st part of the equation is ~50% (they produce a correct vaccine). So, 50% of the time it protects 70-90% of those receiving it.
Let’s take an average, 80%:
If you get the shot you have ~40% of being protected that season. That qualifies as “hit or miss.”
And, it qualifies you for the lose…
#8, this isn’t measles or polio. It’s a virus that most people get over very quickly. This is why I, as usual, listen to doctors, who have been recommending it for people who ARE especially vulnerable.
@#8: Scientific facts are fine, but the mandatory vaccination is not the answer. State should promote and educate about the need for and benefits from vaccination. It should provide vaccination for free and in a convenient way. There its mandate ends. It is up to parents to decide what level of risk they want to accept and what is the level of risk from vaccination in their own opinion. Particularly as everyone who IS vaccinated is protected. So, and damage will not befall general population but only those who chose the risk of not vaccinating. No need for Nany State.
I’ve only had a flu shot twice in my lifetime. Once in boot camp, and I immediately got the flu, the other time (Fall 2000) a week later I contracted Dengue fever (damn near killed me). Were they connected? Who knows, but I have not had a flu shot since…or the flu. I’ll take a pass.
You’re kidding right?
How immediately is your definition of immediately? How do you logically believe there could be any connection between flu vaccine and Dengue? These are unrelated diseases.
My personal experience is a little less exciting. I got flu many years ago. The first time after getting diabetes I noticed that flu wreaks havoc with blood sugar, which is quite well documented for type I diabetics. So, I’ve gotten a flu shot every year since. I got the flu again for the first time last year, the year that the flu shot had the wrong strains. Other than that, it has kept me flu free in every other year that I’ve had the shot.
Don’t believe the hype. If someone tells you that you may get low grade fever and mild flu-like symptoms for a day or two after the shot, that is true. If someone tells you that you can get the flu from the vaccine, they’re just wrong.
Anyway, like anything else, risks versus benefits should be weighed. In this case, for most healthy humans with no other illness, isk of death from flu is low. So is risk from the vaccine. Your call. For anyone with a health condition, such as diabetes, get the shot.
#16 Scott, “How do you logically believe there could be any connection between flu vaccine and Dengue? These are unrelated diseases.”
I think he meant that his immune system was weakened by the flu vaccine. If true (I have no idea if true or possible) then it would be related/connected.
I avoid the flu and the common cold by washing my hands and avoiding children (mobile disease incubators).
#16. Scott- where did I make that connection, I believe I said “Who knows”. Please see comment #11. I am more concerned with the government mandates.
“So, I’ve gotten a flu shot every year since. I got the flu again for the first time last year, the year that the flu shot had the wrong strains. Other than that, it has kept me flu free in every other year that I’ve had the shot.”
And you base this on what? I haven’t had a flu shot in 8 years nor have I had the flu in 8 years. Your conclusion is no better than mine.
What I am gaining out of this thread is that the effectiveness of a flu shot may be person specific. Some people’s immune system apparently react differently than mine.
I rarely get the flu when I don’t get the shot even though many around me do. I get sick much more often when I do get the shot even when those around me don’t.
But it’s feasible that this is how my immune system reacts. Others may be the exact opposite.
mobile disease incubators
MDIs . . . I’ve got to remember that one.
# 14 Paddy-O
“My doctor tracks this and the 1st part of the equation is ~50% (they produce a correct vaccine). So, 50% of the time it protects 70-90% of those receiving it.”
So you have no evidence and just decide to make up data? They used three or more different strains in the shot. Out of those three they only need to be close with one. IN THAT INSTANCE!!!! WHERE THEY ARE ONLY CLOSE!!!!! 70%-90% of otherwise healthy people are protected. THAT IS PRETTY FUCKING GOOD!!!!!
Where the fuck are you getting your bullshit information from????????
The logic you use to reach your conclusion is PLAIN OUT WRONG!!!!!
#22 JJ sputtered, “So you have no evidence and just decide to make up data?”
My doctors conclusion from the evidence he gets is all I need.
Based on his expert opinion my %’s hold.
Doesn’t matter if the shot is against 1000 strains, if there are 2000 strains around.
Your box of Rice-A-Roni awaits.
Thanks for playing.
#18…I avoid the flu and the common cold by washing my hands and avoiding children (mobile disease incubators).
That is of course the best advise, but it also tells us why the schools are doing this. Children are notoriously dirty and spread diseases far more efficiently than (most) adults. And they spread the diseases not just among themselves, but TO adults.
The problem here is as usual, the state. No state mandated and run schools, no problem. But that is a discussion for another day. As long as the state is running the schools, they have a responsibility to take reasonable measures to keep them from being disease factories. Parents who don’t believe in vaccinations should go live in caves.
For the record, 20 years ago, I got a flu shot, promptly got sick and stopped taking the shots for several years. Got the flu each and every year, mostly from co-workers who have young children. So, about 10 years ago I began getting the shot annually, and I might ad, as early in the season as possible. I’ve had the flu once during the past 10 years. Oh, and I got my shot on Wednesday.
Happy phlemballs to you luddies!
Hit or miss? Could be. Study up.
“Yet a new study published Oct. 6 in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine suggests otherwise — that the flu shot in children doesn’t necessarily protect them from illness. Led by Dr. Peter Szilagyi, researchers at University of Rochester studied 414 children aged 5 and younger, who came down with the flu during the 2003-2004 or 2004-2005 flu seasons. These children were compared with over 5,000 controls who did not have influenza during the same seasons. Turns out that flu shots seemed not to make much difference: Kids who got immunized did not get the flu at lower rates than unvaccinated kids. In fact, the immunized youngsters were just as likely to be hospitalized or to visit the doctor as kids who never received the vaccine.”
# 25 Paddy-O
Maybe you should read what you post first.
“But before you decide to skip the flu shot this year, experts warn that results of flu studies like this are all about design. Depending on how a particular trial is set up — which populations are studied, which vaccine is used and how many subjects are included — the results can vary, and quite significantly.”
Nice try but that is one limited group. And it doesn’t say the visited the doctor for the FLU. They could very well have had a regular cold and not the flu.
DUMBASS!!!
Refusing a flu shot is NOT the same as refusing a polio vaccination. They’re just not even close.
All this, “well, it’s good, and it works, and that’s all the justification you need, so just shut up and get the shot” is BULLSHIT.
And (anecdotally) why do I always see these child-free libtards jumping at any chance they get to trample all over parents’ rights? I imagine a future civil court where voluntarily sterilized (zero population growth!) goons make children wards of the state when the parents fail to provide adequate health insurance or education, or forced the kids to go to church too much.
tsk tsk! We reserve the right to regulate your right to rear children! And then they totally freak out when the gov’t taps phone lines. what. ever.
#19, McCullough
And you base this on what? I haven’t had a flu shot in 8 years nor have I had the flu in 8 years. Your conclusion is no better than mine.
My wife, a very intelligent Registered Nurse, hadn’t had a flu shot in years either. Yet last year Mrs Fusion, as even I who had had a flu shot, got the flu. This year she was one of the first in line for a free shot at her hospital.
The flu shot does help reduce the effects of that specific and closely related strains. A person is still likely to get the flu if they are exposed, but it will be much milder to even unnoticeable. Last flu season was the exception as the flu shot strains missed the actual flu epidemic.
Years ago my kid brother bragged to me that all the times he had driven home drunk and never had an accident or been pulled over by the police. Ya roll the dice and ya take yer chances. And may you continue to avoid the flu if you continue to refuse a shot.
# 27 brm
“Refusing a flu shot is NOT the same as refusing a polio vaccination. They’re just not even close.”
You are absolutely right. The Flu can be fatal and Polio wasn’t and the Flu is exponentially more contagious. So you are right they are not the same.
I don’t believe adults expect those in the heath care profession should be forced. Children if they attend public school should be required. You don’t have a right to put other children at risk because you are a fucknut!! If you want to keep your kids and home school them fine then you don’t need to get one.